My players have decided to raid one of the BBEG's hideouts and didn't leave me much time to prepare (session's tomorrow...sigh), so I'm turning to the hivemind for ideas. Here's the scenario:
The BBEG is an 18th-level spellcaster who specializes in soul magic, which is essentially a blend of necromancy and transmutation that uses living souls as fuel for spells. The mage is trying to summon ancient creatures to destroy the world, but she knows that lycanthropes put up a good fight against the creatures last time. To ensure her plans aren't easily foiled, she's been investigating ways to counteract lycan abilities. The hideout the party is raiding is her anti-lycan research lab.
The hideout is a small house in the middle of a city. She has a werewolf (ally of the party) held captive in the cellar on which she's conducted experiments - and yes, this is a rescue mission. She also has access to some gishy cultists as minions, but there's probably only a couple on-site since her research is mostly complete now. I plan to have her show up during the raid for a villain speech, but she can't be bothered to waste her time fighting adventurers when her summoning is 9 days away. At most, she'll sling an AoE spell at them to chastise their hubris and teleport away. This will also be their first meaningful face-to-face with her.
The party is a group of five level 9 characters who can all punch way above their weight class (divination wizard, wolf totem barbarian, forge cleric, trickster cleric, eloquence bard). Two of them are infected with lycanthropy.
What I need help with are ideas for the following:
1. What are some traps she might have in her lab? Her INT score is 23, so they'd be pretty devious and involve silver (e.g., Fog Cloud spell with atomized silver in it).
2. What loot might she leave behind? The party can find some scratch notes on her summoning ritual as well as prototypes of her anti-lycan weapons. Maybe a couple uncommon or rare magic items. Suggestions welcome.
3. How can I flavor this lair to highlight the soul magic concept? This is less important given my timeline, but I like me some thematic dungeons and maybe you have ideas.
I'm not great with building dungeons, even mini ones, so any insight and brainstorming is appreciated. Thanks!
1. Statues coming to life as golems, your PC's are level 9 right? Clay golems are CR 9 too. Stone golems are CR 10 and you can reflavor them as silvered weapons. If you have Tasha's Cauldron of everything there's a neat complex trap called path of blades (I think I got the name right).
2. Maybe she could have a magic weapons that deal extra damage to lycanthropes as a "prototype" for her research.
3.You could use some undead, maybe some Flameskulls.
So with both necromancy and transmutation I might expect to see a few Flesh Golem, and some insidious undead. I'd try the party with some bodaks, and maybe some lycanthropic experiments - power up a few werewolfs by having silver claws grafted to their arms and up their damage dice by a level, and add a Frenzy ability whereby if they hit with all attacks they can attack again.
Guards and wards can be in operation, so fog filled corridors, dancing lights, warded doors and so on. Throw in arcane locks on the doors.
Since they're powerful level 9s, they'll be able to take on a CR15 or so creature, so consider an adult green dragon that has had its wings removed, its brain replaced with the brain of someone else maybe, or consider a beholder who has been trapped in a big glass jar, and a couple of its eyestalks have been surgically removed. The PCs can make a deal to gain its aid.
This kind of wizard is likely going to want to collect souls and use effects that manipulate souls. I would expect disabling effects like unconscious and traps the utilize soul manipulating effects. In that vein I have some ideas:
Soul and mad wizard traps/ effects
The soul cage created by the soul cage spell could be a component of traps or monsters in the area. Effects like the eyes of the dead could be the sensors for traps, monsters could be regularly healed from the life tap effect or you could have a monster that when it downs enemies traps their souls and exploits them in combat. Imagine a golem with a trapped soul that regains 2d8 health every round from it and if a player dies then suddenly they are draining their soul too and regaining health even faster.
The spell magic jar could make for a possession style trap an item could contain a soul and by coming too close to it or touching it a player could end up possessed and their soul trapped in an item. A ghost can do similar but the idea that the wizard did something funky with magic jar like putting an artificial soul in there that serves them or some non human soul like a dog or devil loyal to her could be a funny and potent trap
Another fun trap is based on the spell mislead basically it would trigger a mislead like effect where the players after triggering it would project from their bodies as their souls. They'd be unable to interact with physical objects until they find their bodies again. You could even add spirit monsters that try to hunt them while in this form
a trap from a module is the spell Antipathy/Sympathy cast on a statue. People who failed the save would stare at the statue and wait for a lich to come and consume them
A concept from pathfinder is the doomed condition which reduces the number of saving throws you have before you die. A dungeon warded this way could be terrifying as simply being there saps players of some of their life force. A similar effect is the death curse from tomb of annihilation
effects like sickening radiance do a good job of imitating life drain.There are also effects like that of the weapon of certain death or chill touch which prevent healing. Something with the certain death effect also counts as a magic weapon that bypasses werewolf immunity
The giant spider's venom is good to put on traps because it inflicts Paralyzed on targets. A wizard could easily capture a giant spider and milk it for its venom then use the toxin to immobilize victims. Poison also by passes were wolf immunity
soul cage a scroll or a soul cage itself. A cool item might be a dagger that when you kill a target with it casts soul cage and then the dagger itself acts as the cage until its expended. It could be re-usable or single use like a scroll
sentient magic items. a good one would be a professor orb you could reflavor it as something creepy like an enchanted human head or a pendent. It could even be a werewolf head that can help the players sniff stuff out later
Werewolves I don't think in the first encounter they should have specific anti werewolf devices unless they've researched the party and are expecting them. If they do there could be effects like:
moonbeam in wards or maybe just a wall or even an entire room with its effect preventing werewolves from entering wolf form. Imagine this wizard with an umbrella to block the cursed light laughing at were wolves who are weakened and burn in the light.
caltrops (bag of 20) caltrops made of silver could be nasty and entire combat rooms could be covered in them. I also have a particularly nasty version combined with the weapon of certain death which makes it so they cant regain hitpoints until they make a medicine check to remove the caltrops
mind control effects like crown of madness or [/spell]enemies abound[/spell] on a werewolf could be terrifying. As could some of those possession effects and alike I mentioned earlier. There are also effects like dominate person.
A common trope for werewolves is also the inner animal soul. She could pull it out and they could fight their animal selves.
I could go all day and on stuff but hopefully these give you some ideas.
Be aware that 5 level 9s have a pretty good chance of killing a level 18 in one turn, so make sure your spellcaster has something in place that means that won't happen (or that it doesn't matter if it happens, such as clone or simulacrum).
Be aware that 5 level 9s have a pretty good chance of killing a level 18 in one turn, so make sure your spellcaster has something in place that means that won't happen (or that it doesn't matter if it happens, such as clone or simulacrum).
My thoughts exactly. I'd hesitate to even put the BBEG in the same room with them, even for monologue purposes. Nothing is worse than your players springing a clever idea on you and forcing you to either let them kill the BBEG prematurely, or plot armor them to safety. Maybe the BBEG could astral project in or otherwise appear remotely, so they can do their evil monologue without exposing you to player-plot-annihilation.
PC - Ethel - Human - Lvl 4 Necromancer - Undying Dragons * Serge Marshblade - Human - Lvl 5 Eldritch Knight - Hoard of the Dragon Queen
DM -(Homebrew) Heroes of Bardstown *Red Dead Annihilation: ToA *Where the Cold Winds Blow : DoIP * Covetous, Dragonish Thoughts: HotDQ * Red Wine, Black Rose: CoS * Greyhawk: Tides of War
Maybe the BBEG could astral project in or otherwise appear remotely, so they can do their evil monologue without exposing you to player-plot-annihilation.
This kind of wizard is likely going to want to collect souls and use effects that manipulate souls. I would expect disabling effects like unconscious and traps the utilize soul manipulating effects. In that vein I have some ideas:
Soul and mad wizard traps/ effects
The soul cage created by the soul cage spell could be a component of traps or monsters in the area. Effects like the eyes of the dead could be the sensors for traps, monsters could be regularly healed from the life tap effect or you could have a monster that when it downs enemies traps their souls and exploits them in combat. Imagine a golem with a trapped soul that regains 2d8 health every round from it and if a player dies then suddenly they are draining their soul too and regaining health even faster.
The spell magic jar could make for a possession style trap an item could contain a soul and by coming too close to it or touching it a player could end up possessed and their soul trapped in an item. A [/monster]ghost[/ghost] can do similar but the idea that the wizard did something funky with magic jar like putting an artificial soul in there that serves them or some non human soul like a dog or devil loyal to her could be a funny and potent trap
Another fun trap is based on the spell mislead basically it would trigger a mislead like effect where the players after triggering it would project from their bodies as their souls. They'd be unable to interact with physical objects until they find their bodies again. You could even add spirit monsters that try to hunt them while in this form
a trap from a module is the spell Antipathy/Sympathy cast on a statue. People who failed the save would stare at the statue and wait for a lich to come and consume them
A concept from pathfinder is the doomed condition which reduces the number of saving throws you have before you die. A dungeon warded this way could be terrifying as simply being there saps players of some of their life force. A similar effect is the death curse from tomb of annihilation
effects like sickening radiance do a good job of imitating life drain.There are also effects like that of the weapon of certain death or chill touch which prevent healing. Something with the certain death effect also counts as a magic weapon that bypasses werewolf immunity
The giant spider's venom is good to put on traps because it inflicts Paralyzed on targets. A wizard could easily capture a giant spider and milk it for its venom then use the toxin to immobilize victims. Poison also by passes were wolf immunity
soul cage a scroll or a soul cage itself. A cool item might be a dagger that when you kill a target with it casts soul cage and then the dagger itself acts as the cage until its expended. It could be re-usable or single use like a scroll
sentient magic items. a good one would be a professor orb you could reflavor it as something creepy like an enchanted human head or a pendent. It could even be a werewolf head that can help the players sniff stuff out later
Werewolves I don't think in the first encounter they should have specific anti werewolf devices unless they've researched the party and are expecting them. If they do there could be effects like:
[Tooltip Not Found] in wards or maybe just a wall or even an entire room with its effect preventing werewolves from entering wolf form. Imagine this wizard with an umbrella to block the cursed light laughing at were wolves who are weakened and burn in the light.
[item]caltrops[/caltrops] caltrops made of silver could be nasty and entire combat rooms could be covered in them. I also have a particularly nasty version combined with the weapon of certain death which makes it so they cant regain hitpoints until they make a medicine check to remove the caltrops
mind control effects like crown of madness or [/spell]enemies abound[/spell] on a werewolf could be terrifying. As could some of those possession effects and alike I mentioned earlier. There are also effects like dominate person.
A common trope for werewolves is also the inner animal soul. She could pull it out and they could fight their animal selves.
I could go all day and on stuff but hopefully these give you some ideas.
This was exactly the vibe I was going for, thank you!
I appreciate all the caution about having the BBEG show up in person. My players made it about 60% through the upper floor of the hideout, which is the less secure area, and burned through a decent amount of resources fighting cultists and doing recon. I think they'll have a much rougher go of the cellar level because of the roving monsters and the deadly traps, so it's unlikely they'll have enough juice to do much of anything to the mage even if she did pop by in the flesh. Still, we don't want an underwhelming showing from the baddie, so I'll likely be sending in a simulacrum just to be safe.
Thanks to all for the ideas! Really helped me out in a pinch.
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My players have decided to raid one of the BBEG's hideouts and didn't leave me much time to prepare (session's tomorrow...sigh), so I'm turning to the hivemind for ideas. Here's the scenario:
The BBEG is an 18th-level spellcaster who specializes in soul magic, which is essentially a blend of necromancy and transmutation that uses living souls as fuel for spells. The mage is trying to summon ancient creatures to destroy the world, but she knows that lycanthropes put up a good fight against the creatures last time. To ensure her plans aren't easily foiled, she's been investigating ways to counteract lycan abilities. The hideout the party is raiding is her anti-lycan research lab.
The hideout is a small house in the middle of a city. She has a werewolf (ally of the party) held captive in the cellar on which she's conducted experiments - and yes, this is a rescue mission. She also has access to some gishy cultists as minions, but there's probably only a couple on-site since her research is mostly complete now. I plan to have her show up during the raid for a villain speech, but she can't be bothered to waste her time fighting adventurers when her summoning is 9 days away. At most, she'll sling an AoE spell at them to chastise their hubris and teleport away. This will also be their first meaningful face-to-face with her.
The party is a group of five level 9 characters who can all punch way above their weight class (divination wizard, wolf totem barbarian, forge cleric, trickster cleric, eloquence bard). Two of them are infected with lycanthropy.
What I need help with are ideas for the following:
1. What are some traps she might have in her lab? Her INT score is 23, so they'd be pretty devious and involve silver (e.g., Fog Cloud spell with atomized silver in it).
2. What loot might she leave behind? The party can find some scratch notes on her summoning ritual as well as prototypes of her anti-lycan weapons. Maybe a couple uncommon or rare magic items. Suggestions welcome.
3. How can I flavor this lair to highlight the soul magic concept? This is less important given my timeline, but I like me some thematic dungeons and maybe you have ideas.
I'm not great with building dungeons, even mini ones, so any insight and brainstorming is appreciated. Thanks!
1. Statues coming to life as golems, your PC's are level 9 right? Clay golems are CR 9 too. Stone golems are CR 10 and you can reflavor them as silvered weapons. If you have Tasha's Cauldron of everything there's a neat complex trap called path of blades (I think I got the name right).
2. Maybe she could have a magic weapons that deal extra damage to lycanthropes as a "prototype" for her research.
3.You could use some undead, maybe some Flameskulls.
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HERE.So with both necromancy and transmutation I might expect to see a few Flesh Golem, and some insidious undead. I'd try the party with some bodaks, and maybe some lycanthropic experiments - power up a few werewolfs by having silver claws grafted to their arms and up their damage dice by a level, and add a Frenzy ability whereby if they hit with all attacks they can attack again.
Guards and wards can be in operation, so fog filled corridors, dancing lights, warded doors and so on. Throw in arcane locks on the doors.
Since they're powerful level 9s, they'll be able to take on a CR15 or so creature, so consider an adult green dragon that has had its wings removed, its brain replaced with the brain of someone else maybe, or consider a beholder who has been trapped in a big glass jar, and a couple of its eyestalks have been surgically removed. The PCs can make a deal to gain its aid.
This kind of wizard is likely going to want to collect souls and use effects that manipulate souls. I would expect disabling effects like unconscious and traps the utilize soul manipulating effects. In that vein I have some ideas:
Soul and mad wizard traps/ effects
Soul and mad wizard Loot
Werewolves
I don't think in the first encounter they should have specific anti werewolf devices unless they've researched the party and are expecting them. If they do there could be effects like:
I could go all day and on stuff but hopefully these give you some ideas.
Be aware that 5 level 9s have a pretty good chance of killing a level 18 in one turn, so make sure your spellcaster has something in place that means that won't happen (or that it doesn't matter if it happens, such as clone or simulacrum).
My thoughts exactly. I'd hesitate to even put the BBEG in the same room with them, even for monologue purposes. Nothing is worse than your players springing a clever idea on you and forcing you to either let them kill the BBEG prematurely, or plot armor them to safety. Maybe the BBEG could astral project in or otherwise appear remotely, so they can do their evil monologue without exposing you to player-plot-annihilation.
PC - Ethel - Human - Lvl 4 Necromancer - Undying Dragons * Serge Marshblade - Human - Lvl 5 Eldritch Knight - Hoard of the Dragon Queen
DM - (Homebrew) Heroes of Bardstown * Red Dead Annihilation: ToA * Where the Cold Winds Blow : DoIP * Covetous, Dragonish Thoughts: HotDQ * Red Wine, Black Rose: CoS * Greyhawk: Tides of War
I'm fond of using mislead.
This was exactly the vibe I was going for, thank you!
I appreciate all the caution about having the BBEG show up in person. My players made it about 60% through the upper floor of the hideout, which is the less secure area, and burned through a decent amount of resources fighting cultists and doing recon. I think they'll have a much rougher go of the cellar level because of the roving monsters and the deadly traps, so it's unlikely they'll have enough juice to do much of anything to the mage even if she did pop by in the flesh. Still, we don't want an underwhelming showing from the baddie, so I'll likely be sending in a simulacrum just to be safe.
Thanks to all for the ideas! Really helped me out in a pinch.